In recent years, much effort has been put into the development of automated systems and methods for meat processing in slaughterhouses. EP 985 348 discloses a method and apparatus for longitudinal cutting of the middles of half carcasses. The apparatus comprises a circular saw for effecting a rib-top cut, the circular saw being displaceable in a longitudinal direction above a conveyor, which supports the middle. Another system for cutting middles is known from WO 03/032739, which discloses wedge-shaped conveyor elements and a hook for seizing and holding a middle by the spinal column. An inductive sensor is provided for measuring horizontal positions of an inner surface of the middle at a pre-determined distance below the conveyor. The positions of a cutting device for cutting the middle are adjusted as a function of control signals, which are derived from the measured horizontal positions.
It has been found that the rib-top cuts or spinal cord cuts known from the prior art suffer from the shortcoming that relatively large amounts of meat are being cut off together with the spinal column due to lack of precision in the positioning of the cutting devices for. Generally, the variation of the exact dimensions of middles complicates automated cutting. It must, for example, be avoided that the cutting devices unintentionally engage the spinal column itself, as this could result in the presence of bone fragments in the meat, which would complicate further processing thereof and be unacceptable to consumers. Further, a risk exists that the commercially valuable meat to be processed further and sold is physically damaged due to improper positioning of the cutting device, and damage may even occur to the cutting device itself. Therefore, the cut for the separation of the spinal column is typically placed with a certain safety distance into the meat, which on the one hand minimizes the risk of unintentional cutting into the spinal cord and/or into commercially valuable meat, but which on the other hand results in a relatively high degree of waste, because meat, which could have been sold if left on the middle, is being cut off and discarded together with the spinal column.
Another drawback of commercially available systems for the automated separation of spinal columns from middles of half-carcasses is that separate machines are needed for right and automated systems even less competitive to manual cutting.
The amounts of waste may be reduced in a manual cutting process/in which an operator manually controls the position of a circular saw relative to the half-middle. Even though such a process is labour intensive and hence costly/it is still today the preferred procedure in many slaughterhouses due to the above-mentioned disadvantages of automated systems and due to the low initial investment in cutting equipment.
EP-A-1 736 057 discloses a spine removing method and device/in which a CCD camera captures the position and shape of the spinal column in a block of meat. On the basis of the captured image/a six-axis jointed-arm robot is controlled to position a round-edge body at a certain position and tilt angle. The round-edge body performs two cuts in a V-letter form. It has been found that the V-letter configuration of the cut achieved by the method and device of EP-A-1 736 057 renders the system rather complex and inefficient. Additionally/there exists a further need for minimizing the amount of waste/despite the improvement achieved by the automated system of EP-A-1 736 057.